Fruitless Negotiations Taking a Negative Turn : Baseball: Don Fehr lashes out at owners’ approach, implying that nothing ever changes.

Baseball’s collective bargaining talks, while failing to produce progress, had been conducted, at least, in an atmosphere of detente. Now even that seems to be eroding.

“They bring in a new guy every year with the idea of conciliation and then they try to . . . the players,” Don Fehr, executive director of the Major League Players Assn. said Monday after another fruitless negotiating session that centered on management’s revenue-sharing proposal.

The “new guy” Fehr referred to is Charles O’Connor, appointed general counsel of the owners’ Player Relations Committee after Barry Rona resigned--reportedly under pressure from the owners--on the eve of the negotiations.

Some owners, seeking to create a better relationship with the union, reportedly viewed Rona as a link to collusion and an abrasive negotiator.

Fehr implied Monday that there has been no substantive change in the relationship, though the sides did agree to form a committee that will meet two or three times a year to discuss labor problems.

In the meantime, O’Connor told the Associated Press that the Feb. 15 deadline for reaching an agreement or the outline of an agreement on revenue sharing remains in place. Otherwise, the spring training camps will not open, he reiterated.

“They threaten, they bluster and now there’s no question but that they’re going to have a lockout to show everybody that they’re big boys who can teach the players a lesson,” Fehr said.

“That may be Chuck’s style, but it’s stupid. A lockout serves no purpose except to create greater animosity.”

The revenue-sharing proposal would, in part, eliminate arbitration and modify free agency by use of a salary cap. Any club over the cap could not sign a free agent.

Carl Barger, president of the Pittsburgh Pirates, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Monday that free agency, if left unchecked, would turn the Pirates and teams in similarly small markets into farm clubs for big-market clubs like the Dodgers and New York Yankees.

“Carl Barger is at least being honest about their objective,” Fehr said. “They want to get rid of the market, and the only reason they want to get rid of the market is to bring down salaries.”

The owners will meet in Chicago Friday for an update on the negotiations. They have twice endorsed resolutions on the PRC’s lockout position, according to O’Connor, and that is not expected to change.

A weekend report by ESPN that eight teams--the Dodgers, Angels, Yankees, San Diego Padres, Chicago Cubs, New York Mets, Atlanta Braves and St. Louis Cardinals--now oppose the lockout, could not be substantiated Monday.

Said Peter O’Malley, president of the Dodgers: “We wholeheartedly, absolutely support the PRC position--today and most likely for a long time to come.”